Travel that's nice to the earth and your budget.

Learning Vacation

June 16, 2008

The Audubon Insectarium opened in New Orleans this past Friday. The new museum is 23,000 square feet of bugs, ironically funded in part by a $2 million donation from Terminix, a “pest control” company. The museum's tagline is “infested with fun.” I’m not making this stuff up, people. There’s a butterfly garden; an exhibit that stars local French Quarter creepy crawlies; and “Bug Appetit,” a café where you can watch videos of local chefs cooking up some buggy dishes. Unfortunately (or otherwise?), insects aren’t actually served in the restaurant. Tickets are $15 for adults, $10 for kids, and $12 for seniors. (Audubon members get a $2 discount.)

The hotel is awaiting LEED and Green Seal certification, and their “green initiatives” page on their website is still under construction. But we do know a few things: Some of their rooms were created out from the Fort Baker Officers Residences, built in the 1900s – a great example of re-using existing structures to cut back on new construction. Guest rooms feature organic linens and towels. The resort’s main restaurant, Murray Circle , creates its menu with food available from local producers. Cavallo Point's Institute at the Golden Gate will use the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy's expertise to host sustainability events and programs. It's also rumored that groups who hold their own environmental summits at Cavallo Point may get discounts. Room charges include a 5 percent “Environmental Programming and Sustainability Fee” and a $4 donation to the Good Night Foundation, which helps fund local and global community-development projects.

One of the things I’m most excited about is Cavallo Point’s intriguing list of adventures and programs. These expert-led, multi-day programs let you immerse yourself in everything from yoga to “radical knitting” to wine-country cooking. The one I had to stop myself from signing up immediately for: The Ultimate Running Experience with Ultramarathon Man Dean Karnazes. Four days of runs, yoga classes, and fantastic food with one of my running heros? Perfect. Now, to start saving up the $1765 to reserve my spot.

If you’re thinking about putting down the cash for one of these kick-butt adventures, do it soon: If you sign up for one of their multi-day programs by July 1, you get an extra night free. If you’d like to bask in the Cavallo Point eco-glow freestyle, and explore Pacific beaches and San Francisco on your own, rooms currently start at $250 for a Bayside Queen room (in the historic Fort Baker buildings) and go up to $750 for a Golden Gate King Suite.

June 09, 2008

Here are a few things I wish I'd had time to do while in the Yosemite area recently. Add them to your own itinerary if you're going to be traveling to the park and send me a report! These three are definitely on my to-do list for next time.

1. Volunteer in return for a free night of camping at Yosemite. The massage therapist at Yosemite Bug, Derek, had the inside track to scoring a free night at Yosemite. His girlfriend is a ranger there and runs the drop-in volunteer program. Derek says he talks it up to everyone who will listen because it’s such a great and underused opportunity. Yosemite visitors can sign up to trade a few hours of light labor (planting trees, digging up blackberry bushes, an invasive species, etc.) you get hands-on park education and a voucher for a free night at the park. (Usually $5 to $20.) All you have to do to sign up is visit the main park entrance and ask them to put you to work!

2. Mariposa County wineries: I passed multiple wineries as I drove up Highway 41 from Fresno to Fish Camp, CA, and west on Highways 49 and 140 to Midpines to stay at Yosemite Bug. I’m especially interested in Silver Fox Vineyard because they grow organic grapes.

3. Visit some of the local organic farms to pick berries and gorge myself on fresh produce. I’m sorry I had to leave so early; I saw a flier for the annual “Pick and Gather” at Riverdance Farms two weekends ago. The event is sponsored by local farmers and includes farm tours and organic blueberry and cherry picking. It also promised to “[teach] the importance of our precious regional eco-system, sustainability, [and] the value of supporting local small farms and the farmers that feed us!” Sounds like my kind of event; I’ll have to try to make it next year!

May 21, 2008

Last week I had the chance to talk with a truly inspirational figure in the eco-travel world. Stan Selengut can’t seem to help doing things big. After being a member of President Kennedy’s Office of Economic Opportunity and the owner of a large import company, he retired young at age 44. He thought he’d open a little destination on the Virgin Islands to ease his post-retirement doldrums. “That small inn grew to a really big business,” Stan laughs. Stan started Maho Bay on St. John in 1976 with 18 tent cottages; the eco-camp has been profitable from its first year. (Interesting, given the struggles today’s big companies are having turning green into $green$.) It’s become an example for sustainable destinations everywhere and has grown to 114 tent cottages, more deluxe studios, and another camp, Estate Concordia, up the coast.

Today, Stan is hoping to turn another modest enterprise into a game-changing model. In the 1996 a local park superintendent started a recycling program on the island. Maho Bay lent its support by donating a glass crusher to the effort. Ten years ago, the machine was returned to them when the superintendent transferred off the island.

“Now we had this big glass crusher,” Stan remembers. “Someone suggested craft artists could melt the glass and make stuff.” In typical go-to-it fashion, Maho Bay built a small glass studio and started making modest molded glass items, such as ashtrays, to sell to their guests. Then a few visiting glass blowers taught them some new tricks, and their glass art became more complex. Slowly and surely, Maho Bay built the Trash to Treasure program. Eight staff members and a constant rotation of visiting artists transform the resort’s glass and aluminum waste into profitable works of art.

In addition to its creative recycling, the studio is also energy efficient. The glass furnace runs at 2300 degree Fahrenheit. Pipes run by the furnace to use the excess heat to warm Maho’s water. Some of the furnace heat is also diverted into the studio’s drying rooms. Their ceramic kiln is fueled with wood from old pallets. “Everything comes to the island on pallets,” Stan explains, “and ends up in the dump.” Now they use the constant supply of pallet wood to fire their ceramic artworks.

The studio sold $250,000 in recycled art last year, but Stan isn’t content with just a sustainable, additional revenue stream for his resort. No. Stan wants to take the Trash to Treasure model to the world.

He’s investigating opening a second studio at St. Thomas’s Havensight Mall, a popular cruise ship destination. He’d like to use trash generated by neighboring hotels and turn it into art for cruise guests to buy during their on-land excursions. Eventually, he hopes to attract business from the cruise lines itself. “Can you imagine the amount of waste a ship carrying two to three thousand passengers makes?” Other people see empty Heineken bottles; Stan sees a really pretty color of green, perfect for attractive glass sculptures.

And it doesn’t just have to stop with art, he says. Maho Bay currently sells its excess crushed glass waste to the local construction industry to use for backfill. “Gravel on the island is a couple hundred dollars a cubic yard,” Stan says. “So is sand. Glass can be reduced to sand. We’re at the very beginning of a path that has a lot more complex ramifications than simply making art.”

“I really believe this is for the resort industry a whole new way to address waste,” Stan says. “The travel industry is the most consumptive industry in the world besides the military!”

Stan’s next step is to remake Maho Bay’s low-key, middle-income program to fit a luxury hotel’s needs. He’s in talks with Starwood, which owns the swanky W Hotels, Le Méridien, and the Luxury Collection chains. He also is plotting with Mike Freed, Big Sur’s Post Ranch Inn founder, who is opening a new eco-luxe destination, Cavallo Point at the Golden Gate in San Francisco, this June. Stan would like to start a Trash to Treasure program at the brand-new eco-lodge. Although the price range for pieces at Maho Bay start at $5 for sun catchers and top out at $200 for the really spectacular sculptures, Stan believes there’s a lot of room at the top, pointing to similar Murano glass artworks sold for $3500 a piece.

The financial potential is fabulous, but what Stan really gets excited about is the opportunity for economic development. On St. John, the construction boom has kept unemployment low, but Stan projects a Trash to Treasure program could help offer much-needed jobs in more economically depressed areas. Once molds have been made, employees without previous art skills could make some of the pieces, as well as create numerous fabric projects made from a resort’s old linens. “I’d really love to do one somewhere like the Dominican Republic or Dominica,” he says.

“I’m 79 years old already, and I’m really sort of impatient to get something going!” Stan says. To keep up with this fast-moving septuagenarian, sign up for Maho Bay’s e-mail newsletter. He's sure to have an interesting future.

May 17, 2008

Lisa Wissinger, who owns Acadia Cottages in Maine with her husband, Gordon, says their eco-friendly destination was inspired by a visit to Camp Denali in Alaska’s Denali National Park. “It is a wonderful place that really encourages and educated on how to ‘get back to nature,’” Lisa says. “It was a life-changing trip for us. Once we came home, we really began to seriously work at being environmentally responsible and were no longer satisfied with living in ‘corporate America’.”

If you’re looking for a paradigm shift of your own, Camp Denali and its sister lodge, North Face, open in June, and close the second week in September, like they have since 1952. Days at the lodges revolve around eco-sensitive tours into the park lead by trained naturalist guides. Nights feature learning sessions. You can time your trip to coincide with visiting experts who will teach guests on topics like energy independence (Johnny Weiss, director of Solar Energy International), climate change (researcher Henry Huntington), and photography (National Geographic photographer Jim Brandenburg). All this exploring and learning is fueled by the lodge’s kitchens, which feature produce from the lodge’s green houses and jams made from native berries.

All-inclusive rates (transportation to the lodges from the Denali Park Rail Station, meals, activities, lodging) start at $1365 per person for three days. There are also four-night packages ($1820 per person) and week-long stays ($3185). If you’re looking for a simpler vacation, you can rent Hawk’s Nest, a self-catered bunkhouse that sleeps four. There’s no electricity, but there are fabulous views available for $375 per night for four people.

Judging from the guest comments on Camp Denali’s website, the Wissingers aren’t the first (or the last) to be inspired by the place. I know I’ adding it to my eco-travel daydream list!Photographs from www.campdenali.com.

Acadia Cottages opens this Friday, May 16, and will be open through October 19. High season is July 4 through September 1. Owners Gordon and Lisa Wissinger will reward you for kicking back and staying a while: Visits of six days or longer get 10 percent off the bill. All rooms include yummy eco-amenities like Natura Apricot Keratin shampoo, conditioner, and bath gel.

King Suites: One bedroom with a king bed, one living room with a sleeper sofa or Areobed (perfect for kids!), a kitchen and dining area, bathroom with shower, and deck with sitting area. $115 per night for two. $129 per night, high season. $10 per night per person for additional guests. Minimum stay of four nights.

King Studios:One king bed, dining area, kitchenette, bathroom with shower, and deck with sitting area. $105 per night for two. $119 per night, high season. Minimum stay of two nights.

Queen Studios: One queen bed, dining area, kitchenette, bathroom with shower, and deck with sitting area. Rustic cottages have pine paneling and cathedral ceilings: $99 per night for two. $109 per night, high season. Traditional cottages are a steal: $89 per night for two. $99 per night, high season. Both have a minimum stay of two nights.

Lisa encourages you to take your time exploring Acadia National Park, whether on foot or by bike. She and Gordon do the same: "We love the peaceful atmosphere of our property and enjoy any chance we get to be outside watching and listening to birds and enjoying the beauty of the environment."

If you need a book for the trip to Maine, Candice Stover's Poems from the Pond should put you in the Acadia mood. For your i-pod, Lisa suggests Norah Jones's Come Away with Me. "We had just purchased this CD and listened to it the first time we came to Acadia to camp at at Blackwoods Campground so we always associate it with Acadia," she says.

May 13, 2008

This is the first year I’ve been privileged to live in close proximity to an REI, and I’m definitely going to miss the quick access to great outdoor gear when we move in August. REI’s just-released 2008 stewardship report has some great green highlights:

They get 20% of their power from renewable sources and are trying to increase that percentage.

Their ecoSensitive products feature recycled, renewable, and/or organic materials and are labeled to help explain to consumers how those material choices are made.

Finally, and most relevant to this blog, they partner with Bonneville Environmental Foundation to offset all their fabulous REI Adventures. Their carbon-neutral tours are one of my favorite places to get a quick travel daydream fix. Here are a few packages that sneak under Green Postcards’ $150/day price limits (If you’re an REI member; $20 for a lifetime membership. Trust me. You’ll make up the cost with your annual member refund – usually 10% of what your combined purchases for the year):

April 24, 2008

The bed and breakfast at Artha Sustainable Living Center doesn’t just offer travelers a guilt-free vacation (with solar power and heat, organic amenities, and chemical-free food) – it teaches its guests how to take those eco-practices home with them.

Artha is in central Wisconsin, outside of Amherst and about an hour and a half west of Green Bay. Chamomile Nusz is Artha’s program and marketing director and the daughter of its owners, Bob and Marguerite Ramlow. “Artha, in one form or another, has been around for 37 years,” Chamomile explains, “and we opened the bed and breakfast in 2007.” Many of their guests come first to learn, then to relax.

“Our biggest eco-effort is education,” says Chamomile. “We try to teach by example and reach out to people all over the U.S.” Beyond the on-site workshops, Artha also acts as a solar consultant, designing systems for home and business owners without local solar providers in their areas. The center has definitely proven that those who can, teach.

Artha’s 4-kilowatt photovoltaic system provides the B&B and the on-site office with 75 to 85 percent of their energy needs. Solar thermal collectors – 800 square feet of them – heat the facilities’ water, 85 percent of the office space, and 25 percent of the B&B space (efficient wood stoves make up the difference). In the future, Chamomile says they will install fan convector radiators to increase the amount of solar-heat they get in the B&B.

They put similar forethought into their guest accommodations. The B&B was renovated with wood from their own 90-acre property and from the sustainable forests of the local Menomonee Indian Tribe. The linens are organic cotton, as is the produce served up straight from their garden. Non-VOC paint and energy- and water-efficient appliances are without.

Come back tomorrow for Artha’s rates and Chamomile’s suggestions on prime times to visit. Photos courtesy of www.arthaonline.com

March 29, 2008

Awasi is chic enough to be named to Travel+Leisure's "It List" last year, but socially aware enough to feature private tours exploring the Atacama desert's culture and nature with the guidance of local communities. It's swank enough to have a link on its website giving instructions on how to get to the resort via private jet, but sensitive enough to build its facilities out of local materials such as stone, adobe and wood. I'm drooling over the stark beauty of the Atacama landscape (mountains, sand dunes, lakes, llamas) and the simple luxury of the eight suites.
(The outdoor showers look especially nice.) Start saving your pennies, kids (even if it means cutting back on the Chilean wine we've talked so much about this week). Rates start at $1,000 (per person, double occupancy) for a two-night, all-inclusive stay. (Rates include transfers, food, drinks, and private tours.)

March 06, 2008

We’re going to keep the luck ‘o the Irish going this week. For those of you who think potatoes and beer when you think Irish food, take a big bite out of Orchard Acre Farm. This 19-year-old organic farm in County Fermanagh grows salad greens, herbs, fruits (including tomatoes), and flowers for its guests and local restaurants. You can stop in for an afternoon to attend one of their many eco-training sessions or book their roomy eco-tipi, a new addition to the farm this past year, for longer stays.

Orchard Acre Farm is part of Ireland’s Greenbox, eco-tourism network, for good reason. They purchase renewable energy, use solar power to heat their hot water, and use wood-burning cookers. They keep their energy costs down by using efficient appliances, double-glazed windows, and lots of hemp insulation. They try to offset their small carbon load by planting trees; a new two-acre willow garden is planned for this year. To cut down on emissions even further, the farm is trying to convert their vehicle to run on waste vegetable oil.

Orchard Acre Farm collects rain water for both household water needs (laundry and toilets) as well as irrigation for the garden. Teresa O’Hare, who has co-owned the farm with Hugh McCann since 1989, says their cleaning supplies are all non-toxic. “Baking soda is a big favorite – as is elbow grease,” she says. Even the curtains are eco-friendly -- they make their own from reclaimed fabrics. The same goes for bed linens.

The farm also does some serious eco-outreach. They have an extensive catalog of eco-tourism training programs and also offer tailored green consultant services. Like Omagh Hostel, they are WWOOF (WorldWide Opportunities in Organic Farms) hosts, which means volunteers who want to learn about organic farming can trade labor for room, board, and education. If Teresa has her way, the farm will start to host an annual eco-festival to spread the green word even further.

Come back tomorrow for more details on the farm’s tipi rental and upcoming activities!